


Many Strange and Scrumptious Dishes

by DoctorSyntax



Category: James and the Giant Peach - Roald Dahl
Genre: Cannibalism, Community: sharp_teeth, Gen, Horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-21
Updated: 2012-01-21
Packaged: 2017-10-29 21:46:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/324499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoctorSyntax/pseuds/DoctorSyntax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For a <a href="http://community.livejournal.com/sharp-teeth">sharp_teeth</a> prompt: <em>The hunger wins. It always does.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Many Strange and Scrumptious Dishes

There are skeletons buried beneath the old peach tree; they had been corpses first, until the moment a little boy tripped and one thousand long, slimy crocodile tongues burrowed in the tree’s gnarled roots. Peaches cannot grow without nourishment, not even when magic is involved, but buried in the chalky, dry soil there is more than enough flesh for a miracle.

*

There are ten thousand children in New York City who are always hungry. Some of their parents smile and give them an extra helping, _growing children need their food, what a healthy appetite_. These are the children whose doting parents woke them up one night— _come outside, something's landed on the Empire State Building_ —children who can say, _I was there when James Henry Trotter touched down, and I helped eat the peach_.

The more they ate, the hungrier they will stay.

*

There are six-foot bugs and one young man who never forget the first taste of that fantastic peach. But, as they soon discover, regular peaches do not taste like _their_ peach; nothing does. As the years pass, they sample every exotic dish they can get their hands on, searching for the right taste, the perfect texture. Meat comes the closest, but it’s not the same. Not enough by a long shot.

They look back on that night and remember; remember how hungry they were, how they gorged themselves on tender, juicy flesh. Remember it as the last night they ever felt full.

Until the day comes when they find a dish that satisfies, and one by one they are lost.

*

There are ten thousand teenagers in New York City who are always hungry. Some of them look at their boyfriends, girlfriends, and want to touch and bite and _taste_. Some of them do. These are the ones who slice their lovers open and lick at the wounds; when they are finished they smile with mouths smeared with red, blood in the cracks of their teeth as they grin. They find others like them, convince themselves their hunger is carnal, and hover on the edge.

One day they will slip, but not yet. The hunger blooms slowly, but they will be the first to succumb.

Others develop a taste for red meat: fast food hamburgers, extra-rare steaks, _cook that just long enough to kill the bacteria, I want it to moo when I cut into it_. It sates them for a time, but the cravings always return. They indulge because they don’t know how else to make the hunger go away, eating themselves into obesity and heart disease; _better be careful. You’ll be dead before you hit 30_.

They don’t know they’re the lucky ones: spared of the worst, because as children they only managed a few mouthfuls of peach before it was gone.

*

There are six-foot bugs and one grown man who cannot stop once they have begun; there are ten thousand young adults who remember the night James Henry Trotter landed on top of the Empire State Building, who many years ago heard his tale and befriended the saddest, loneliest little boy in the entire world.

When he is exposed and hunted, some of them form an army. James’s Family, they call themselves, and every day their numbers grow. They will follow him until the end of the earth for an adventure like the one that brought him to their city.

Anyone who tries to stand in their way doesn’t live to tell about it, now that the hunger has awoken.

*

There is a peach pit in Central Park; picked clean of its flesh long ago, it stands empty and abandoned, waiting for a miracle. It will wait until it decays into dust, like the skeletons under the old tree.

There are half-eaten corpses buried beneath the peach pit.

The hunger wins. It always does.


End file.
